ISSN 1492-8132
Issue 90, © 2004
No reprints without permission

Our new CD of Robirda's canaries singing is an improvement in every way. It consists of 12 16-bit true-stereo tracks, each averaging almost 5 minutes long, for a total of 58 minutes and 48 seconds of canary songs. There's a 10 second mp3 sample at robirda.com/songs.html Listen carefully, and you will be able to hear the different positions of each bird!

We are pleased to annouce that we're offering New Songs From The Birdroom at a special price of only $10.00 (plus $2.99 shipping and handling). This price won't last long, so order yours soon!

Bird & Cage Co has made it their goal to provide bird keepers with great quality cages and accessories for great prices. The newest cage might just be one of the best pet canary cages you will ever see!

There are some great deals available to bird owners, from small and large pet birdcages, to breeding cages, stands, and some of the best flight cages anywhere. There's even free shipping for the continental US! See Robirda's cage reviews for more.

For a full selection of cages and cage accessories, visit BirdandCage.com.

This website's main page looks a little hard to read for those who use Internet Explorer, but you can easily highlight the text and links to make them more readable. Your reward will be access to some wonderfully comprehensive information on canaries, african greys, and parrotlets. You are unlikely to be sorry you took the time to look around, and like a lot of us you just may find yourself referring back to some of these articles again and again... when you're not referring them to others, that is!

An experienced avian vet can be hard to find, especially one with some experience working with the smaller birds. One of the best online resources for finding an avian vet is the website for the Association of Avian Vets.

But what if you have used their search tool, and still found none listed anywhere near you? You may think that this means that there are no avian vets near enough to consult - but perhaps there is somebody closer than you think.

Try phoning some of the listed avian vets from futher away, and ask if they can recommend somebody closer to you. Many fairly experienced avian veterinarians don't belong to the AAV, but those who do will often tend to know all the avian vets in their locality, and may be happy to recommend one to you.

You can also check with wildlife rescue organizations - very often they have lists of vets who haved volunteered their services, and they may know of one who has experience with small songbirds. 'Real' avian vet or not, a vet with such experience will usually do quite well with a finch or canary!

Welcome to Robirda's Companion Birds eZine

For breeder or pet bird owners who care.

Hello! Welcome to Flock Talk's 90th issue. Subscribe and unsubscribe information for the email version of this ezine is at the bottom of this webpage.

Website News

We have an unusual event this month; not only is this a leap year, giving us 29 days in February, but it is probably the only February you will ever see with three issues of Flock Talk and five Sundays!

As some of you know, Robirda's been seriously ill over the past couple of months, and is only now starting to return to normal. Our website has been getting more visitors than ever before, and as you can imagine, we've gotten very backed up on answering emails and posts. Robirda's available working time is still limited, so it may take some time to get caught up.

Robirda's part-time helper has been doing his best, but it's not been easy. So if you've sent us a note that went unanswered, it could be we accidentally missed it; please send it again. (It's a good idea to include a clear and specific subject line so that we will know not to delete your email as spam.)

Whenever you send us a note, please be sure to include a working email address for us to reply to (rmmeyer, take note!) We've also received 'email' consultations through the post, with payment included but no email address; if this is you, please drop us a line so we will know where to send your answer!

Feature Article

We've all seen them, and some of us even have them, for part of every year; aviaries filled with groups of canaries who appear to get along beautifully. For a new pet owner, it can be very confusing to see this, and then be told that their new pet bird does not need or even like company in his cage!

Like many small birds, canaries display obvious flocking instincts, particularly when feeding, that can seem to indicate that they enjoy and even rely on having company nearby. For a youngster or (for most of the year) a hen - and occasionally even a male - that is true, for part of the year at least.

Yet those same canaries are demonstrably territorial the rest of the time, especially during the spring, and some have been known to kill each other, when required to share a pet cage.

Learn to understand how these two apparently opposed facts work together to produce the canary's (and most other songbird's), basic nature, and you will have made a good step towards...

by R C McDonald
www.robirda.com
Copyright © 2004

It's easy to see how a new canary owner can think that their new pet would prefer company in his cage - it's a very common and easily made mistake, for a social creature such as a human. Yet the #1 cause for premature death in pet canaries is probably due to owners thinking their pet canary needs company, and requiring him to share a cage.

Appearances can be very deceiving, especially when it comes to canaries! Ask a breeder if he keeps his canaries like that year round, and if he is honest, he will tell you that he does not, because he cannot.

Three or more male canaries can share a large cage for about half a year or so, perhaps a little more. Two canaries should never be allowed to share a cage, unless they are a breeding pair - and even then, they need to be in full breeding condition before being paired. Before and after pairing and breeding, they will need to live in separate cages.

Another fact that can confuse new pet owners, is that the environment within a large walk-in flight cage containing ten or twenty birds is rather different than that of a smaller cage with the same number of birds.

It is not too difficult to find somebody who keeps multiple canaries in an aviary all year, and they often tend to pooh-pooh the idea that canaries should not share such a cage year-round. Yet experience has shown that the average lifespan of canaries who live this way will tend to be, at the most, three years or so - often as little as a year.

Many breeding birds have a average lifespan of from three to five years or so - yet a pet canary living in his own cage may live for 10, or even 15 or 20 years!

Why? The answer is simple - stress! Breeding, and living in shared aviaries, causes stress; and the more stress a canary is required to deal with, the shorter his lifespan will be.

It's true, though, that canaries do like company - but they like their company to be nearby, rather than inside their own cage.

'Company' is a rather loose term, in this context - it can be as simple as a radio playing, or it could be another bird in a nearby cage... or it could be you! Canaries are easy-going and adaptable, as long as they don't have to share their private space with another canary.

To put it in slightly more human terms; a similar scenario might be you inviting some stranger in off the streets to share your bedroom.

An old canary breeder's joke shows a picture of a family in their living room looking at a canary in his cage, thinking "Poor thing, he must be so lonely in there all by himself," while the canary, in turn, is looking back at them and thinking, "Poor things, they must feel so harrassed, packed in all together like that!"

People are social creatures, and often find it difficult to understand that a canary can be both friendly, and territorial. It may sound odd to us, but it is true nonetheless.

If you are interested in more reading on this topic, try using the 'search site' tool at www.robirda.com/search.html.   Enter a phrase like 'sharing a cage' or 'sharing cages' or 'two birds' to find all the info posted. There is quite a lot, especially in the Flock Talk archives. You can restrict your search to our sites, or you can search the entire web. Either way, you should find some rather interesting reading, as this is a fairly common topic amongst canary owners.

by R C McDonald
www.robirda.com
Copyright © 2004

Product Review

Finally, an invention intended for birds who live freely in our homes! This clever window-seat come from a family 'owned' by a group of birds who are regularly allowed out to 'play'. The family canaries soon proved that canaries love to use these seats as much as the larger birds do.

There's little as entertaining for a bird as spying out what's going on outside, or soaking up a few sunbeams; and now your pets can do that and more, with no damage to or droppings on your windowsills! These Wingdow seats for birds comes in various sizes, for birds as small as canaries or as large as a macaw. Check them out, you'll be glad you did!

* * *Do you know of a great bird product? Why not review it for Flock Talk readers? We will be reviewing foods, cages & cage accessories, toys, and other bird items, in upcoming issues. To arrange for a review, send us your inquiry and a brief description of the product(s) here, with the subject line 'Product Reviews'

Behaviours & Personalities

She's spent most of the winter with my other hens in a large flight cage. For some time now I have been coming into the birdroom only to find 'Clever Girl' out and about; wandering around the floor looking for tasty bits, over by the male flight pestering the boys, or exploring the stack of clean (currently empty) breeding cages. Each time, one of the small hen flight cage doors was propped open.

I've spent quite a lot of time trying to figure out just exactly how I've been managing to forget to close a cage door so often, but a few days ago, I found I was not quite so forgetful as Clever Girl has been making me feel.

It was shortly after dawn, and the birdroom lights were not on yet. (My lights come on a bit after natural dawn, to allow the birds more time to wake up - and me more time to sleep in.) Most of the birds were still asleep, but I noticed as I passed the birdroom door that Clever Girl was up.

She was standing on a seed cup by a cage door, and apparently didn't realize I was there, because as I watched she pushed her head under the cage door, hitched her body as close as she could get, and then heaved mightily, using all her strength to slide the small door up until it caught and stayed up on its own.

Mission accomplished, she hopped merrily out of the cage and down to the floor to forage, while I shook my head in admiration and awe. I've seen her do this twice since, and have to say, she doesn't seem the slightest bit interested in leaving the birdroom; she could, but apparently prefers to stay close to the rest of the flock. She does seem to get a great amount of enjoyment teasing them from outside their cages!

Interestingly enough - and luckily for me! - none of the rest of the hens have figured out how to follow her in and out. She returns to the flight cage on her own, and spends more time inside than out, so I haven't yet bothered to peg the sliding doors shut. I might yet, if it seems needful, and have told her so several times now; she tilts her head and appears to consider my words, then gives me a cheery little cheep and hops off.

Perhaps she doesn't understand me, as many would insist; but my guess is that, like many of our pets, she may just understand more than I think...

Tips 'N Tricks

A few mites living in a bird's air sacs will not stop it from singing, but as the infestation grows, breathing becomes more difficult, and eventually singing will stop.

An avian vet can check for the presence of these pests, and if you suspect that your bird may have them, it is always wise to check that they are actually present before initiating a treatment. The problem is that some diseases have similar symptoms, but controlling them requires very different treatments; the treatment for air sac mites will not help such an infection, and may in fact weaken the bird and make it worse.

The preferred treatment for air sac mites these days is a tiny drop of Scatt on the bird's skin, or two drops of Ivermectin given 10 days apart. Do note that some vets don't seem to realize that Ivermectin is ineffective against the eggs of the air-sac mite; for this reason, it must be administered twice, 10 days apart, or the pests will simply return.

Timing is critical, as you must kill any adults that have hatched from the eggs, before they can in turn lay more eggs. It is for this reason that Scatt is a better choice, even though it is very similar to Ivermectin; unlike it's older chemical cousin, Scatt will stay in the bloodstream for up to six weeks, making thorough eradication of these pests far more certain.

Whichever is used, both Scatt and Ivermectin are very potent drugs, and either can have a negative impact if used on a bird who is sick, rather than infested. So if you suspect that your bird(s) may have air sac mites, it is a very good idea to get an experienced bird-vet to take a look and check that these little pests actually are the source of your bird's problem, before deciding on a treatment.

For You & Your Birds, With Love

Our next issue is due March 14th. We hope you and your birds stay safe, well and happy in the meantime, and we look forward to seeing you all then! 

Robirda
Feb 29, 2004